FTB: Two Days, Two Games

And our last weekend before we move house.

The Leafs finish their road trip this weekend with a back-to-back with travel and a crossing into the Western Conference.

Today is the Hurricanes, tomorrow is the Predators. And note the weird time of the Sunday game: it starts at 6:00 pm.

Matt Knies and Mike Koster play today at 6:30 pm as Minnesota meets Veeti Mietenen’s St. Cloud State. The winner of this game goes to the Frozen Four in Tampa in early April. The game is on TSN+ and ESPNU.

Other prospects:

Topi Niemelä is out of the playoffs in Finland, and unless the Finns are thinking of adding him to the national team for the World Championships, he should be available to join the Marlies soon. Men’s Worlds start in mid-May.

Roni Hirvonen and HIFK can close out their quarterfinal series today with a win, and move on to the semis.

Other news

You don’t say.

From the link in Seravalli’s tweet:

Aspen police arrested Barroway at approximately 9:35 a.m. at the Limelight Aspen on Monarch Street, according to police records. The call to authorities was placed at 8:42 a.m. Court records show he and his wife had been involved in a verbal altercation that turned physical.

He is under a court order that prohibits from having any contact with his wife, except when it involves their children. Barroway also cannot consume alcohol, per the court order.

In addition to a second-degree assault charge related to strangulation, a Class 4 felony, Barroway also faces a third-degree assault charge, a Class 1 misdemeanor, according to an updated court affidavit.

Please note that the particular team a person owns a stake in is not part of their morality, and does not explain their behaviour. Describing violent acts in terms of team rivalries diminishes the seriousness of the crime. Not everything is about fandom.

Noted Flyers fan visits with noted Habs fan and says the expected:

Oh no! What if someone says something bad about the Leafs!!! That would make it a day ending in y, so you know, it’s fine. We’ll all be fine.

At 6-foot-7, Thompson has a chance to make NHL history by becoming the tallest player to ever score 50 goals and/or finish with 100 points in a season, according to ESPN Stats & Information research. Through March 20, Thompson scored 42 goals and 87 points through 69 games, which already makes him the tallest player to ever score 40 goals and record 80 points in a season.

There has long been a theory, or maybe myth is a better word, that those players who are a lot taller than average will never skate well, and naturally don’t have high skills. The paradigm of hockey players as either skilled or physically intimidating helps explain this idea.

I think it’s also another, equally false, view that the total possible ability of a player is a mix of skill and toughness and more of one requires less of the other. Players as pie charts where every player has the same total value. Add in some confirmation bias and you can decide that no one who scores goals is ever tough, and any player who doesn’t score much needs to be Mr. Hitty or he’s useless.

What if the Leafs fondness for the towering prospect who has gone undrafted isn’t quite what it seems. What if it’s a marke… no I won’t say it. But maybe it is.